Professor,Good to hear from you again and trust you to note the seemingly paradoxical behaviour of your belly under the circumstances. Perhaps the wine version could be under your shoes so that you appeared to grow both drunker and shorter.

Ah yes, a great acquaintance of mine, Dr H. Hackenbush (I believe you may have encountered him?) would benefit immensely if I were to don such a gadget - by creating the impression that one is diminishing in both height and width, while simultaneously growing increasingly unsteady on one's feet, the onlooker will feel drunk before they actually are, thus making them a.) a cheap date and b.) allowing them to wake up without a hangover. Perhaps yourself and Big Nige could have a trial run? Yours, Prof Quincy Adams Wagstaff

A blog about, among other things, imaginary ideas - What ifs? and Imagine thats. What if photographs looked nothing like what we see with our eyes? Imagine that the Berlin Wall had never come down. What if we were the punchline of an interminable joke? All contributions welcome.